Mosaic images are used daily throughout the world. One common use of a mosaic image is a weather map. Several frames from different satellite positions are generally used to form a mosaic for the weather maps viewed during weather forecasts. There are many other uses for mosaic images in industry, and government. There are also many other uses of mosaic images by consumers.
Mosaic images are generally formed from a series of overlapping images that cover a scene. The overlapping images are aligned and merged to produce a picture that allows a viewer to visualize an entire scene with a much larger field of view. More specifically, creating a mosaic image includes registering a set of images to compute alignment parameters into a single image. In some instances this includes stitching several scenes or frames together. In other instances, a large number of scenes or frames must be stitched together, such as forming a wide-angle horizontal strip through 360 degrees and then matching the two ends to form a continuous circle. In other instances a number of two dimensional scenes or frames are stitched together to form a full-circle spherical view of an environment. Once the frames are stitched together, various artifacts are removed or compensated for. For example, blending between the frames removes seams between the scenes or frames. The individual images can also be pre-processed to remove artifacts from the lens used to produce the scenes or frames.
Mosaic images can be used to produce a still output or a video output.